Red-Hot Kiwi Cyber Law Debate

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Red-Hot Kiwi Cyber Law Debate

WELLINGTON, New Zealand – New Zealand might be in breach of its bill of rights if it decides to pass into law legislation that allows security services to intercept electronic communication, a representative for the New Zealand Council of Civil Liberties said today.

The proposed law "is ill-conceived and Draconian in regard to its interference with rights," Michael Bott told parliamentarians undertaking a review of the proposed laws.

Bott was one of many lining up to critique a proposed amendment to New Zealand's Crimes Act, which on one hand wants to outlaw computer hacking, and on the other exempts law enforcement and security agencies.

Minister of Communications Paul Swain argues that these exemptions are necessary to catch criminals who are using new technology. But many witnesses at Friday's committee hearing protested at the proposed exemptions.

Privacy Commissioner Bruce Slane supports the proposed tightening of laws to prevent cyber crime but is nonetheless concerned at the prospect of security services gaining access to computers remotely and too easily.

"It seems to me that law enforcement officials secretly snooping on peoples' computers, in circumstances where it will be a crime for others to do so, paints a highly distasteful picture," Slane told the parliamentary committee. "Any covert policy hacking should only be allowed in the most extraordinary circumstances and certainly not as a routine matter authorized by a simple search warrant."

"I think we are taking a very big step into secret policing rather than open policing," he said.

The committee heard other witnesses echo the privacy commissioner's concerns. "We feel uneasy about the exemptions in the bill that permit the state, in certain circumstances, to intercept communications," Richard Davis from an umbrella group of churches in New Zealand said. "We do not accept the argument that only criminals have something to fear from such an expansion in the surveillance powers of the state. Too often we hear of the violation of the rights of innocent people."

The Law Commission, an independent body which reviews New Zealand's laws, told the committee that the proposed law was "not state of the art."

Law Commission President Justice Baragwanath said the law, if passed, should only be considered an interim improvement, and advocated a thorough review of the Crimes Act to bring the law up to date. He argues that a country like New Zealand, with parliament the sole legislature, should be able to establish a model law.

"We take the view there is a need for a radical, proper look," Baragwanath said. "Otherwise, it's a matter of putting patches on as the criminals get ahead of us."

Telecommunications companies at the committee's hearing stayed away from arguments over privacy and offered support for the bill in principle. However, the companies also suggested improvements to the committee.

New Zealand's largest company, Telecom New Zealand, wanted to see denial-of-service attacks made into a crime and wanted the issues of the cost of any interception requests clarified. Telecom also wanted more clarity in the proposed law about the interception of data calls.

The members of parliament on the committee will now consider Friday's oral submissions and other written submissions and report back to parliament by the end of May.